inside her BORN TO BE BAD T-shirt looked dirty, and her grungy bare feet were thrust into rundown flip-flops.
There to bear witness that she had indeed willfully written checks against a closed account were managers from the Dobbs IGA, the Cotton Grove Winn-Dixie, and the Dik-a-Doo Motel and Lounge out on the bypass.
Cyl finished reading the charges.
'How do you plead?' I asked.
'I need me a lawyer.'
'Didn't you hear me tell everyone who wanted an attorney to come forward?' I asked sternly.
She tugged at the T-shirt that skimmed the waistline of her dirty yellow shorts. 'Yes, ma'am, but all them won't here then.' She gestured with her head toward the three stern-faced complainants. 'I figure now I might maybe need somebody speaking for me 'fore they put me under the jail.'
'Do you have a job?'
She shook her head. 'I did work out at the towel factory, but I got laid off last year and now they've shut down and I ain't found nothing yet.'
That factory closed completely two months ago and more people than she were out of work these days.
'Very well.'
Phyllis held out the form and pointed her toward the bailiff standing by the door to my right. I told the complainants, 'Sorry, folks.'
They knew as well as I did that Lydia Marie Duncan would probably qualify, which meant that the case would have to be rescheduled, which meant losing another day of work and in the end, even if they got the judgments they sought, they'd probably be back in court a time or two to have those judgments enforced.
The mills of justice ground on.
Over Cyl DeGraffenried's objections, I dismissed various charges of possessing drug paraphernalia, making threats, assault with a deadly weapon, and failure to stop for a stop sign. On the other hand, I did find a twenty- nine-year-old black male guilty of trespassing. He got a six-month sentence, suspended for a year on condition that he stay off the premises of the Winn-Dixie, make twenty-four dollars restitution to the store, pay a hundred-dollar fine and costs, pay a hundred twenty-five dollars for his court-appointed counsel, and break no law for one year. This was the second time he'd stolen steaks from the same grocery store—'I get tired of chicken all the time'—and I could sympathize with the manager wanting him to stay out of his store.
Before reading the next charge, Cyl motioned to a shy-faced young woman in the audience. The witness came with head-down reluctance and sat in the chair beside Cyl with a timorous half-smile.
I knew exactly what was coming.
'Line ninety-eight. Jerry Dexter Trogden. Assault on a female.'
The young man who'd been seated beside the witness swaggered forward. He had light brown hair that hung almost to his shoulders, a Fu Manchu mustache, and tattooed on his right forearm was a bright green-and-purple dragon. He signed the waiver of counsel with a flourish.
And how did he plead?
'Not guilty.'
'Your Honor,' said Cyl, 'the prosecuting witness refuses to testify and wishes to take up the charges.'
She was still a teenager and there was a stand-by-my-man look in her eye. I wondered how many more times he'd knock her around before she'd quit believing he could change.
'Are you sure this is what you really want to do?'
'Yes, ma'am.'
'Then I have no choice but to rule the prosecution frivolous and order you to pay court costs.'
She followed that egg-sucking hound over to Phyllis's stand to pick up the papers and then out to the cashier in the hall to pay their fifty-one dollars.
It was 12:20.
'Court will be in recess till one forty-five,' I said. * * *
When court's sitting, a table is always reserved for judges at the Bright Leaf Restaurant, a half-block away on Second Street. As Ned O'Donnell and I came down the courthouse steps and headed there, the hot and muggy July day wrapped itself around us like a damp bath towel someone else had used first.
'Rough morning?' I knew that he was hearing a messy statutory rape case.
He shrugged. 'I've seen worse. What about you? How do you like the view from the bench?'
I tried to look decorous. 'I've seen worse.'
Like me, Ned O'Donnell had grown up on a working farm and he gave me a conspiratorial grin. 'Beats housing tobacco, don't it?' * * *
'All rise,' said the bailiff. 'This honorable court for the County of Colleton has now resumed its sitting for the dispatch of business. God save the state and this court.'
It was precisely 1:45.
The ranks had thinned considerably. Now the courtroom held less than a third of what it had this morning.
